"Thanks awfully," said Leslie, his teeth chattering as he spoke. "We would like to be called if you do haul in the nets."
Although neither had cared to admit it, both boys were glad to retreat to the snug shelter of the cabin. The lamp lit, they made no attempt to turn in, but talked and read, to the accompaniment of the minute blasts upon the foghorn, which Peter used with vigour.
"It must be nearly daylight," said Guy at length. "It's now nearly three o'clock, and the sun rises at half-past four. I'm not in the least bit tired, are you?"
Before Leslie could reply, there was a violent scuffling of feet overhead, and a chorus of shouts from Skipper Runswick and his crew.
The lads looked at each other in wonderment, then, seized by a common impulse, made for the companion ladder.
Before they were clear of the doorway, a terrific crash shook the Laughing Lassie like a rat in the mouth of a terrier; then with a fearful lurch she heeled to starboard.
The swinging lamp, hurled from its gimbals, was smashed into a thousand fragments against the skylight, plunging the little cabin into intense darkness. The two lads, in company with every article that was not securely fixed, rolled to leeward in a confused heap.
Before they could regain their feet, they were dimly aware that water was pouring into the stricken vessel.
The Laughing Lassie was making her last voyage—this time to the bed of the North Sea. Cut half-way through amidships by a lumbering tramp, the skipper of which, with a ruthless disregard for the Rules of the Road at Sea, was driving his craft at full speed ahead, the ketch was doomed.
In a very short space of time, barely sufficient for the crew to clamber on to the bows of the ramming vessel, the tramp had drawn clear, while the Laughing Lassie, with Leslie and Guy still in the cabin, was already on the point of disappearing beneath the waves.